Her choice is clear, he's right for job: Phillip Morris

Those who understand the value of a daily bowl of oatmeal tend to be well-adjusted. Retired Cleveland Judge Jean Murrell Capers, who turned 95 last month, is one of the most well-adjusted seniors on the planet.

Over oatmeal and toast Wednesday morning, Capers mused at length about the presidential prospects of Sen. Barack Obama, a man less than half her age. He clearly excites her.

“I can’t wait to vote for him. I believe he’s going to make a fine president,” said Capers, who in 1949 became the first Negro woman ever elected to Cleveland City Council. (She prefers not to be described as black or African-American.)

“I can’t wait to see his wife and those little Obama girls in the White House. That will be a truly remarkable thing for America.”

Capers, who cast her first presidential ballot for Franklin D. Roosevelt and several years later shared tea at the White House with his wife, still practices law. She drives herself to her office near downtown every day. She still accepts speaking engagements.

She served on Cleveland’s Municipal Court for eight years in the 1970s and has likely forgotten more about the city’s history and its charter than some current council members know.

To call her remarkable is an understatement.

Wednesday morning, I met her at her favorite diner intending to pick a fight. Over breakfast, I pressed the immaculately dressed nonagenarian on why she wasn’t supporting Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton.

Why wasn’t Capers — a pioneering feminist (she also rejects that label) — casting her lot with Clinton, a presidential candidate who continues to face many of the social challenges Capers faced when she went to law school in 1940 and later ran for public office?

Why was she choosing the man over the woman?

“I’m supporting Obama because he’s Negro,” Capers said without a hint of reservation or concern about how the statement will be interpreted.

“But I’m also supporting him because he’s the right candidate. He’s the right person for the job.”

Even after suffering a stroke in 2006, Capers retains an extraordinary mind. She chooses her language with precision.

“My decision not to support Clinton has nothing to do with the fact that she’s a woman. That’s irrelevant. I’m not supporting her because I don’t like some of the decisions she’s made. I don’t relate to her.”

Capers was born seven years before American women were permitted to vote. She remembers her parents, both teachers, talking about the significance of female suffrage. It stoked early political fires.

Social pioneers like Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony and especially Mary McLeod Bethune helped shape her outlook. So did her mother.

So, whether Capers likes the description or not, she has lived her magnificent life as a feisty, groundbreaking, feminist, public servant and civic activist.

Now, however, presented with the opportunity to vote for America’s first viable black presidential candidate, this woman born 51 years after Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation sees no choice.

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